Theodora: Empress of Byzantium (Mark Magowan Books) (21 page)

But Justinian did not simply wish to erase two centuries of history. His restoration would bring new power dynamics. For him, the throne would not act simply as the supreme moderator among the empire’s various movements and power groups; it had to launch new initiatives and steer the entire political and social body. To this end, he would have to strengthen his grip on all the tools needed for the job, starting with direct access to and control of fiscal revenues. So the provincial elite were to feel the effects of his policy: he found them unreliable, self-interested, and focused on local matters, not engaged in working for the glory of the empire that Justinian felt would soon be his.

In 521, Justinian at nearly forty was inaugurating his first consulship: it was an office that, since its establishment more than a thousand years earlier in the first Rome, had become largely honorific. He was replacing Vitalian, one of his victims, and he needed to make people forget his predecessor.

Justinian ordered that feasts and banquets be held; in addition to horses and chariots with splendid trappings, his arena shows included lions, leopards, and other wild beasts. The animals came from the most remote provinces of the empire, or were purchased from merchants and ambassadors to exotic kingdoms that were friendly to the new Rome, such as the Ethiopian kingdom of Axum, whose major Red Sea port, Adulis, enjoyed mercantile and ecclesiastical relations with Constantinople.

Justinian ingratiated himself with his city’s populace by dispensing
gifts, surprises, and games, but he used other means to prove his mettle to the power elite. It was said that he spent 288,000 golden solidi in consular celebrations. Assuming that this is a reliable figure, and that Procopius elsewhere reports reliably on the empire’s gold reserves at the end of Anastasius’s reign (23,040,000 solidi), Justinian’s celebrations burned up 1.25 percent of the gold reserves accumulated in almost thirty years of administration. Such a figure would make a cautious imperial administrator pale—but not the self-confident Justinian.

19. Ivory diptych celebrating Justinian, 521, Castello Sforzesco, Milan.

He showed similar self-confidence, even arrogance, in the ivory diptych that celebrated his consulship [
fig. 19
]. The piece gives a unique twist to the visual conventions and the content traditionally seen in these self-promotional displays. Unexpectedly, his portrait does not
appear on the ivory, but only his name and his majestic series of titles: “Flavius Petrus Sabbatius Justinianus, Illustrious, Count, Master of Cavalry and of Rapid-Response Infantry, Regular Consul.” An elegiac couplet is inscribed in the radiant discs that decorate the diptych:

Munera parva quidem pretio sed honoribus alma

Patribus ista meis offero consul ego

I, Consul, offer to my elders these gifts

that carry a small price but great honor.

With the arrogance of the powerful, Justinian downplayed the monetary value of the diptych, while stressing the honor and prestige that he offered the senators (the “elders”). In the final analysis, everything—from the value judgment to the offering itself—revolves around him. So sure is he about the quality of his offer that he doesn’t even feel the need or the duty to have his portrait on the diptych. He has become a mere voice, an
authority
: this is a foreshadowing of medieval custom, appearing in the context of the most classical of Roman institutions.

The word
ego,
“I,” the last word on the inscription, emphasizes his gesture, his will, his concession. He gets the last word, and it is the key to interpreting the entire text. This artifact and its inscription make it quite clear that Justinian thought highly of himself as a man and a politician. Eight centuries later, Dante Alighieri expressed it concisely in his famous line in the
Paradiso
, “Caesar I was, and am Justinian.”
²⁷

Long before rising to Dante’s Paradise, Justinian met Theodora on the Earth—but when? She must have spent considerable time with Severus, Timothy, and their circles, long enough that her Monophysite beliefs sank in quite deep, and long enough for her to consider Timothy her “spiritual father.” Then came her journey across a great distance and her important sojourn in Antioch. These factors are crucial in trying to pinpoint a date for the meeting between the actress (or former actress) and the most powerful man in Constantinople. It must have occurred in the year 521 or 522.

In the absence of solid data, literary myths have flourished: Syrian Monophysite legends, the various Western medieval versions, and that of Robert Graves in his
Count Belisarius
(1938). In the Byzantine Middle Ages there were numerous folk tales about a “house of Empress Theodora” in Constantinople.
²⁸
In that house, people said, the reformed actress spent her days “spinning wool.” It’s an evocative and edifying image, but the house belonged to another Empress Theodora, who lived in the ninth century.
²⁹

Having finally set foot in Constantinople, Theodora awaited an audience with Justinian, whose power was visible all around her. She must have led a secluded life, renewing relations with her family (starting with her sister Comito) and with the city’s Blues. At the same time, she tried to exchange letters regularly with Antioch and with her spiritual teachers in Alexandria.

If any former theater colleagues had suggested that she ask the stars about her future, they would probably have found that Theodora was less than enthusiastic. Her soul had changed during her journey, just as her complexion had probably darkened: she had become more introspective and serious. She must have been twenty-one or twenty-two years old, and she left other young women to chase after the old flattery: cheering audiences, the lust of powerful men, proof of one’s own powers of seduction. She had no idea whether she had come back as a “lady,” as a
kyria
with dominion over something; she was mistress only of herself.

She may have viewed the chance to meet the powerful Justinian as a secret interpretation or transformation of her very name. That meeting was God’s gift. She would not fail to honor it.

The day came when she was invited to the palace of Hormisdas. Comito probably wanted to supervise her sister’s makeup and her choice of garments; she must have made sure that no fewer than eight slaves carried her litter [
fig. 20
]. Even though Theodora was unwilling to return to her former life, both sisters knew that such an occasion was also a theatrical event. In a vestibule of the palace of Hormisdas, we can picture Theodora waiting, thinking about the “lord” hard at work behind a velum [
fig. 15
]. Perhaps she too examined her position:
once more she was outside, in the hallway, the waiter and the pursuer. And the pursued? He was probably busy studying a map or reviewing the draft of a law.

20. Lady Danelis going to the palace in her litter, miniature from Ms. Matrit. Gr., Vitr. 26-2, second half of the 12th century, Biblioteca Nacional, Madrid.

When Theodora was finally admitted into his presence, he must have thought that he was seeing for the first time. Before him stood the actress he had heard something about, who had belonged to the Blues by destiny and by vocation since her earliest childhood. But he saw more: he saw in her the new Helen of the Ecumene. Theodora must have appeared to him to be truly a “gift of God.”

To her, Justinian must have appeared a fully accomplished man. His regular features bespoke health and a full and active life. He had no markings or affectations. He asked precise questions, and listened thoughtfully to the answers.

The lord preferred to speak Latin but probably graciously shifted to Greek, with which his guest was more familiar. In Greek, he most likely expressed himself in archaic, twisted sentences that she found belabored but amusing. With Macedonia’s letter in his hand, perhaps he pretended to need help from Theodora (who was young enough to be his daughter) in deciphering the Greek that he “did not possess fully, while you,” he might have said, “possess it innately.”

“I wasn’t able to study as much as I would have liked,” said Theodora.

“I said that you are mistress of it [
kyria
] innately,” he replied.

In that palace, the powerful man used the word
kyria
for her. It was a sign, a gift.

In its long history human language has evolved from the simplicity of an exclamation to the complexity of a subordinate clause; but in that first meeting Theodora and Justinian traveled the other way. The elaborate expressions, the hypothetical, conditional, and subjunctive verbs, the sophisticated Greek optatives were streamlined into a linear, indicative style. The present tense became the only tense. There was a pause, then an imperative. Sentences crumbled and shrank to single words, then to monosyllables. Conjunctions between sentences fell away from their conversation while buckles and pins fell away from their garments. Then only sighs were left.

Justinian’s hands, which were accustomed to handling papers and unrolling maps, now slid over Theodora’s smooth body as it lay there pulsing with life. She didn’t curl up into herself like an inanimate parchment roll or, as the sacred texts write, like the heavens will roll up on the day of reckoning (when all lives will end, at the end of time and of eons).
³⁰
Justinian stretched himself out beside her and embraced her youthful form.

And Justinian asked her, the “infamous” one, to embrace
his
body, the body of a “lord,” of the man who wielded the highest political power. He must have wondered how he had survived, in his former life as Flavius Petrus Sabbatius and later as Justinian, without this embrace.

Perhaps he asked to hear her story. He must have been pleased to hear about the Blues and how they had saved her in the Kynêgion. He might have been disturbed to hear about her life in the theater and her adventure in Pentapolis, and surprised to hear about her experience in Alexandria. And he must have admired her for her journey, the cities and the lands that she had seen.

Probably Justinian told her little about himself, not only because
the powerful rarely confide in others, but also because of manly habits common in the ancient and then the Byzantine world. He probably told her more about himself in later encounters, not directly but by referring to his readings, whose echoes enriched his conversation. He must have told her over and over again that she was “as desirable as the treasures of Solomon” and much, much more. Justinian longed to emulate Solomon, the king of ancient Israel and builder of extraordinary buildings; he had been a man of exemplary justice and author of wonderful works. Above all, he had written the passionate
Song of Songs
.

Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth

for thy love is better than wine.

. …

The king hath brought me into his chambers.

We will be glad and rejoice in thee.
³¹

Justinian must have whispered this to her, and then explained it. He must have laid out the Orthodox interpretation, whereby the
Song of Songs
celebrated the union of the Church with Jesus Christ, or of the individual soul with the Incarnate Word. He probably did not gloss over another interpretation that was suspected of heresy, the literal interpretation: that the poem described the physical union of King Solomon with the daughter of the king of Egypt, the fair Shulamit, his legendary bride.

We do not know what language the two lovers spoke together. Theodora probably listened most of the time. Then, one day, she must have discreetly reminded him that she too came from Egypt, even though she was not a king’s daughter. And that she had finally “entered
her
king’s chambers” where there was so much “rejoicing and exultation”
³²
together. She hoped she was not uttering heretical words. But if it was a diabolical heresy, which was guilty—the body or the mind? It was her king’s privilege to illustrate that point if he wanted another embrace, where their two different “persons” (if not their two “natures”) would be joined.